Burbank Cultural Arts Commission

Leah Harrison

Leah Harrison is a producer with a breadth of arts experience ranging from performance, arts administration, and arts activism. Her career started as an actor on New York and Los Angeles stages. From there she transitioned into stage managing and producing international theater productions. She has produced in multiple disciplines including film, television, theater, and themed entertainment. As a themed entertainment show producer, she has a breadth of experience managing and producing attractions internationally, ​including acting as Executive Producer for an internationally celebrated parade which included worldwide artist. Ms. Harrison has used her passion for art and community building by working as a volunteer and community organizer for grass roots campaigns and arts organizations. She​ has a long history of volunteerism with women’s groups around the country.  Various companies and organizations​ with which she has collaborated include Film Independent, FOX television, Warner Bros., Universal, AFI, and ​Women In Film.

Stefanie Girard

Stefanie Girard is a graduate of the Pratt Institute in New York City, with a degree in Industrial Design. Her career includes over 20 years in the Los Angeles TV and Film industry, first as a Set Decorator and then as a Television Producer specializing in how-to programming focused on home arts. This work led her to publishing how-to books as well as designing and producing content marketing for the craft publishing and manufacturing industries. Her own work expresses a unique take on how art functions within community, drawing on a knowledge of craft making, industrial production and public interaction. Her “Art Candy Machine”, a vending machine dispensing small artworks in her Burbank neighborhood, is emblematic of this desire and capacity to successfully move art making and art appreciation outside of museums or galleries and literally onto street corners. 

“My current artwork is informed by the power of words and quotations. I strive to artistically elevate selected words through my choices of font, materials, application techniques and presentation surfaces. I strive to combine these elements plus additional images in ironic and unexpected ways to create something that is both aesthetically pleasing and meaningful. My work includes large modular installations created with sometimes unusual, sometimes mundane objects like bricks and paper, embroidery and wood along with traditional acrylic paint, watercolor and porcelain. The best compliment I can receive is for the viewer to have a laugh out loud or “ah-ha” moment as they get the joke or juxtaposition that I have hidden either within the artwork or perhaps in plain view after a bit of contemplation.”

Mercedes Yolanda Cooper

Mercedes Yolanda Cooper was raised by a mother who owned an art gallery and father who was a former English teacher, musician and sometimes writer. At age 13 she found her voice by participating in community youth theater. Through proximity to artists who created art reflecting her image and her involvement in public arts programs, Mercedes was fortunate to grow up feeling connected to herself as well as to a larger world. For over two decades, Mercedes has been immersed in the intersection of creativity and community, a journey that has taken her from being a student filmmaker to her current role as Senior Vice President of Public Programming at ARRAY.

ARRAY is a Peabody award-winning arts and social impact collective dedicated to narrative change, founded in 2011 by filmmaker Ava DuVernay. Mercedes oversees initiatives such as the cinema and conversation series ARRAY 360, community movie pop-up ARRAY Drive-In, Liberated Territory: An ARRAY Masterclass, as well as past brand partnership events with The Broad, the Estate of Jean-Michel Basquiat, LA Phil, Juilliard, and Reebok.

One of the highlights of her 13 year tenure with ARRAY was shepherding the Law Enforcement Accountability Project (LEAP) which commissioned artistic projects from visionaries in the fields of photography, poetry, music, culinary art, dance, mixed media, design, film, and audio art to elevate activist storytelling around the issue of police brutality.

Before joining ARRAY, Mercedes coordinated national workshops for a non-profit journalism organization as well as freelanced as a special events script writer and graphic designer. She has earned an M.F.A in Film and Video Production from Columbia College Chicago, a B.A. in Economics from University of Maryland College Park and also studied abroad at the University of São Paulo in Brazil. She loves traveling internationally, exploring museums and art spaces, dining out, and decorating her home of four years in Burbank.

Mercedes is committed to championing safe spaces for audiences to discover, discuss, and engage with art and films that are often not accessible to the general public.

Eric Connor

Eric is a writing instructor at the New York Film Academy in Burbank, where he’s previously served as Dean of Students and Chair of the Screenwriting Department. He has over fifteen years of teaching experience, ranging from Graduate Level to youth coursework. He’s also taught for the Writer’s Store, the StarCoach Program in China, the Young StoryTellers, the American Stage Festival and the Animation Guild. You can currently hear him on the bi-weekly podcast The Backlot.

Eric is producing the feature length documentary Aswat Acherim, detailing the unlikely friendships formed across the Gaza / Sderot (Israel) border. His first screenplay Just Enough won a Sloan Scholarship and was accepted into the Hamptons Film Festival Writer’s Lab. Eric’s writing credits include the TV pilot Side Hustle with Hayden Black (HDNet’s Goodnight Burbank) and the screenplay The Mysteries with Robert Gardner (The Wedding Palace). As part of a team with Chad Rocco, Eric adapted the NY Times bestselling young-adult series Vampire Kisses and developed a feature film based on Knotts Berry Farm’s Halloween Haunt.

Eric received his BA from the University of Pennsylvania (Go Quakers!) and his MFA from USC (Go Trojans!). He was part of the Leadership Burbank Class of ’17, has served on the LB Alumni Board and is a board member for Burbank Temple Emanu El. A native Delawarean, Eric lives in Burbank with his wife Lauren, their sons Alexander & Judah and dogs Sharkie & Fezzik.

Jackie Brenneman

Jackie is an executive with the National Association of Theatre Owners where she oversees strategy on legal, policy and industry issues that impact movie theaters in the United States and across the globe. Jackie is also a proud co-founder of Burbank’s Conundrum Theatre Company, which provides high-quality performance opportunities to performers in traditional day jobs. As a leader at Conundrum, Jackie has made it her mission to include local businesses such as breweries and restaurants in the conversation to help promote these small business owners while also promoting the arts. Jackie is also a mother of two young children who attend schools here in Burbank. Jackie is a lover of all things arts and Burbank and is honored to be part of this Commission. 

Cindy Pease

Cindy Pease is a retired retail executive from a fortune 500 corporation. She served on the Burbank Cultural Initiative Planning Steering Committee for the Arts in 2009/10 and served on the Burbank Cultural Arts Commission since its inception. In 2008, Ms. Pease received the Character and Ethics Project Award with certificates of Recognition from: CA Senator, Jack Scott, CA Assemblyman, Paul Krekorian, Glendale Mayor, John Drayman and Michael Escalante, Ed.D. Superintendent for Glendale Unified School District. She was the former President for Pacific Ballet Dance Theatre for 13 years and now, currently holds the position of Managing Director for The Musicians at Play Foundation, Inc.

Ms. Pease has completed certification required by Los Angeles County Arts committee for inclusion of California State Standards for the Arts in all School Outreach Programs. Being a strong advocate for the classical and performing arts is her goal and to raise public awareness regarding the benefits of arts education and performance while making Burbank a major cultural arts destination.

Monica Pa Moye

Monica Pa Moye is an attorney who manages litigations for The Walt Disney Company. Monica is also an adjunct professor at the University of Southern California, Gould School of Law, teaching a course in Copyright law. Prior to Disney, Monica worked as a litigation associate for Davis Wright Tremaine LLP, and other law firms in New York City. She clerked for the Honorable Rosemary S. Pooler in the Second Circuit Court of Appeals. She received her J.D. from New York University School of Law, graduating with high honors, and she was the recipient of the Walter J. Derenberg Prize for Copyright Law. In addition, Monica has advised numerous art organizations in New York and served on the board of the New Arts Dealers Alliance. She is an amateur ceramicist, and she coaches her two children’s basketball teams.

Katherine Zoraster

Katherine E. Zoraster is an Art Historian and an Adjunct Instructor of Art History at several local colleges. Among them, she is the Art History Instructor for the full-time program at the Los Angeles Academy of Figurative Arts and has recently begun teaching in the Osher Lifelong Learning Institute through both the UCLA and CSU Channel Islands Extension Programs. Katherine received her undergraduate degree from the University of California at Los Angeles with a double major in English Literature and Art History in 1998. In 2005 she graduated with a Master’s Degree with Distinction in Art History from the California State University at Northridge. She is a long-time Burbank resident and is thrilled to be sitting on this Committee helping to support and encourage the arts in Burbank.